[Techtalk] USB wireless as an AP?

[Alvin Goats]

Linux is pretty good at finding out that something is attached to it, be 
it PCMCIA or USB. What you generally have missing is something that will 
accept the thing as a driver.

I have an Airlink101 PCMCIA wireless G card, there isn't a driver 
available in the Linux distros and Airlink101 doesn't have one either, 
but Linux knew that something was attached. HOWEVER, I emailed the 
supplier and talked up how nice it performed in WindowsXP (it does), and 
how I wanted to use it in Linux. Seems their design engineers like it 
also (running on their own Linux boxes) and pointed me to the chip 
supplier (RAlink) who used to have drivers, but now points you to a 
consortium they are part of that have the OPEN sourcecode for the 
drivers for the RAlink chip sets as well as an application software that 
helps scan and set up your card for use. Mine is the RT61 chipset.

The driver is written only for the chipset, not for the PCMCIA or USB 
interface. Consequently, the driver will work on this chipset whether it 
is USB, PCMCIA or PCI bus (Airlink101 has all three options).

This is true for most hardware. If you have a video  card that says you 
only have 4 modes of operation, check out what the chip set has (I had a 
card like that once, 4 modes advertised, 32 modes by the chipset that 
actually worked).

This is why a lot of the geeks tear open their gadgets to see what's 
inside, the chip specs often have lots more capability than advertised 
on the gadget and you often have access to those extra goodies.

My suggestion then, is find out what the chips are in the Belkin 
wireless and see if you can find Linux code for it. You might have to 
e-mail the manufacturer, who might point you to some other group that's 
doing device drivers for the chipset.

Alvin